An Unconscious Transversion
A Struggle to Homogenise
Author: Anonymous
Like most sensitive topics in this forum, I’d like to discuss the treatment of religion and faith in my school.
I know my school’s history. I know it like the back of my hand because I have done my research so I do not require the exasperated exclamation at the end of this article- “But it is a missionary school!”
It was built by a Christian missionary in the 19th century with the primary aim of educating the girl child. It was built when India was a British colony and Christianity was the most respectable way to refine oneself, to shed one’s ‘coarseness’ and become a ‘gentleman’/’gentlewoman’.
The roots of Christian education and the associated ideals ran so deep that during my formative years in school, I was made to feel that Christianity was the most superior religion of all.
In elementary school, we were compelled to buy the New Testament and the Hymn book which was an anthology of Christian hymns.
Scores of impressionable minds underwent proselytization- not the formal ceremony per se — inwardly.
I knew the Lord’s prayer/Amazing Grace better than anything from my own religion because we sang it twice during the week during the morning assembly.
And all of this would have been fine had other religions been equally treated with the same profundity of respect and importance. Muslim students would generally wear white salwars and dupatta to school which they would take off at the open/uncovered shed built outside the main building. One morning during the assembly, the Principal said “I don’t see why Muslim girls need to wear their white trousers and carry a scarf while coming to school. They never wore it before so why do they have to do it now.”
An unnecessary remark delivered by the Principal of a reputed school in a ‘secular’ country. If these Muslims girls say anything about their school now, they are demonized and harassed but needless to say, they were victims of an unsaid prejudice since their childhood in their alma mater.
When I wanted to attend scripture classes (primarily meant for Christian pupils but quite a few pupils from other faiths were also present), the class teacher pulled me up in front of the entire classroom and asked me, “Do you know your Ramayan/Mahabharat in its entirety that you want to attend Scripture classes?” I never understood why this question was asked by a teacher whose primary aim is to educate without making any distinction. One may not know everything, but there is no reason why they cannot learn something they want.
The proselytization that happened in school was a continuous process that began since the time you stepped inside those gates. It went unnoticed because it was concomitant with the learning of English language. A lot of parents, themselves deprived of the boon of the English language, wanted their children to learn English- the lingua franca of the globalized world. So while no one noticed a change in the child’s faith or lack of it, we hardly paid attention to the concept of ‘second’/ ‘third’ language which inevitably implied a standardized hierarchy of language — English first, then Bengali/Hindi, then Bengali/Hindi- (A couple of ‘north-eastern’ languages were offered too). For all the well-educated English-speaking educators we had, nobody thought about the implications of this nomenclature of classification on the students. Consequently, many of us had inferior vocabulary in our own vernaculars (vis-à-vis the English language). Often, children would be punished for even speaking in their own language. (I myself have taught language classes so I know one doesn’t need to punish students of any age for speaking in another language.)
Please do not take me for a religious/linguistic fanatic. Religion doesn’t bother me but prioritizing one religion/language over another, especially in the current state of affairs, is not a subject I would want to learn in school.
About the Author: Anonymous
The author of this piece identifies herself with a cat.
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